Some Days You Should Just Stay in Bed

Posted by Cynical Sarah on December 1, 2006

Sometimes it seems like the whole world is conspiring against me accomplishing certain things. Last week, not only was nature against me, but so was the Canadian postal service.

I’ve been working to get my house back in South Dakota sold since September. I’ve got a buyer now and am trying to get things taken care of via long distance so that the deal can close without too many problems. Last week I got the warranty deed to sign over everything and I had to find a notary, get it signed and overnight it back to South Dakota so everything could keep running smoothly.

The day I got the document I couldn’t find a notary who could fit me in, so I ended up making an appointment for late in the afternoon the following day. I knew I was probably asking for trouble since the appointment was at 4:30 p.m. and I was still hoping to find a way to overnight it that same night.

The first snag in the plan came with the weather. In Vancouver, rain is pretty typical for the fall. This day was more than just the usual constant drizzle though. This was a full out storm with huge gusts of wind and torrential rain. My umbrella was completely destroyed on the way to the notary – little metal pieces hanging off and no way to ever open it again – so I tucked the paperwork inside my coat and made the five minute walk from the Skytrain to the notary’s office with stinging cold rain and wind pelting me in the face.

I still made it on time, but my timeliness and journey through the rain weren’t rewarded with prompt service. I didn’t actually get to sit with the notary and get my paperwork signed until almost 5 p.m. At that point I knew I could pretty much give up any hope of getting the deed overnighted that night back to South Dakota.

I still wanted to at least get it taken care of at the post office so I wouldn’t have to worry about it, so after I was done at the notary, I caught the bus up to the mall. Thankfully, the rain had stopped, so I didn’t have to hold the paperwork inside my coat, which made me look like I was trying not to be sick the whole time I was walking.

That one perk was the only one I was going to get that evening though. I got to the mall, and despite my first instinct to just go to FedEx, I went to Canada Post to see what their overnight service is like. It turned out to be a little less expensive than FedEx, and even though it wouldn’t go out until the next day, a Thursday, it would definitely get there on Friday.

So I paid my $29.70 for overnight service and filled out the form on the envelope and went home. At home, I sent my realtor an email letting him know he wouldn’t get the paperwork on Thursday but it was guaranteed to get their on Friday, then I went to the Canada Post Web site and signed up to get an e-mail when the letter was delivered, and then I stopped thinking about it since it was all taken care of.

That should have been the end of it, but I started to get a little worried by the late afternoon on Friday when I hadn’t received that confirmation e-mail. The first thing I did when I got home from work was to check the tracking on it at Canada Post to see if it had been delivered. I couldn’t believe it when the tracking showed it had just left the post office here in Canada that day, rather than Thursday, so of course there was no way it was going to be delivered that day.

All the real people working the customer service line were gone for the day of course when I called Canada Post’s 800 number to talk to someone. I needed someone to voice my frustration to though (Almost $30 for overnight service and now it wasn’t going to get there until Monday!) so I called the Canada Post branch where I had dropped off the parcel in the first place.

There I was greeted by a man with a heavy accent, and I’m not quite sure if he really understood half of what I was saying either. I swear, some of these people just use their accent as a barrier to complaints like mine. Like if they pretend they don’t really understand, they can just pass it off to someone else, which is pretty much what happened. Once I explained several times what had happened, I finally got the response of “Let me give you the number to the Canada Post helpline, and they can help you.”

You could say I just wasted a good 10 minutes of my life with that phone call, but on Monday, I’ll be calling that helpline to complain. Plus, I’ve already filled out the online claim form to get a refund for my “guaranteed” overnight service.

There’s something to be said for companies like FedEx that can give you a guarantee and actually mean it. Government services like Canada Post just aren’t as worried about keeping a good reputation in order to get return business. But you can bet money on it that I’ll be using FedEx for anything important like that again in the future to save myself from writing an angry column about my experience late on a Sunday night again.

- Sarah L. Polson

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